we're all sold out

If we have any alarm clocks in stock, they would be on the bottom shelf right here. Let's check ... uh-oh, I'm afraid we're all sold out.

 

Hi,

I'm sure that "they're sold out" sounds more reasonable than "we're all sold out" in the above" in that it's "the alarm clocks" that are sold out." What do you think? Thanks.

Thanks, Bernice.

To make sure, doesn't "we're all sold out" work? The original is from an English magazine, and it uses "we're all sold out."

<edited by moderator to remove demeaning language>

>I'm sure that "they're sold out" sounds more reasonable than "we're all sold out" in the above

How would you know? 

we're all sold out

is very idiomatic and means

this store has completely sold out that item (the clocks)

Hi Angliholic

As I see it, 'sold out' is used as an adjective in 'we're all sold out' (i.e. a state of having sold one's entire supply of something). I don't see this as being an incorrect usage or only colloquial by any means.  Saying 'we're sold out' is quite natural and is used extremely often.

The word 'all' is used for emphasis and means completely -- i.e. it emphasizes the fact that we don't have a single one of our supply of things left, and it modifies 'sold out'.  The only thing that sounds a bit informal to me is the word 'all'.  I'd use 'completely' if I wanted to sound a bit more formal.

If you said 'They (our alarm clocks) all sold out', the words 'sold out' would be used as a verb, and the word 'all' would refer back to the word 'they'.  Using 'all' is not as natural in this case because it sounds as though you might be trying to say "Each individual piece of our supply sold out" / "Every one of our alarm clocks sold out" -- and that doesn't make sense.  You can "sell out" of a quantity of something, but you cannot use "sell out" to refer to the sale of one thing.

That's my take.

A curious combination, isn't it?  Avangi and I had a discussion about these kinds of would in another thread.  I sense that there are two paradigms here, only one of which is the "traditional" or "proper" conditional, alternating between will and would.<>

1.

If we have it, it will be on the second shelf.

If we had it, it would be on the second shelf.

 

The second paradigm has what may be called the would of probability, alternating between would and would have.

2.

If we have it, it would be on the second shelf. (= If ..., (it seems to me that) it is probably on the second shelf)

If we had it, it would have been on the second shelf. (= If ..., (it seems to me that) it was probably on the second shelf)

Perhaps should and should have can even be used in this pair. 

___________

On the other hand, it's all very mysterious; I may just be imagining things!

CJ